Chaotic Elections! A Mathematician Looks at Voting

Scope Lecture, Saturday, October 11
Donald Saari, University of California-Irvine

Donald Saari, Distinguished Professor of Mathematics and Economics and director of the Institute for Mathematical Behavioral Sciences at the University of California-Irvine, will present this years Scope Lecture. He is also the inaugural speaker for the Department of Mathematics Distinguished Lecture Series.

It would be difficult to find a more appropriate keynote presenter than Saari for this years Scope Academy. Widely cited in both academic and popular publications as an expert in voting methods, Saari will visit NC State a few short weeks before the all-important 2008 presidential election to discuss whether election outcomes really capture the will of the voters.

The author of 11 books, Saari is a member of the National Academy of Sciences, American Academy of Arts and Sciences and the American Association for the Advancement of Science; a Guggenheim Fellow; past chair of the US National Committee of Mathematics; and past chief editor of the Bulletin of the American Mathematical Society. He has received honorary doctorates from Purdue University, Université de Caen, and Michigan Technological University.

A native of Michigans Upper Peninsula, Saari received his BS in mathematics from Michigan Technological University and his MS and PhD in mathematics from Purdue University. He was a member of the faculty at Northwestern University for more than three decades before moving to UC-Irvine in 2000, where he continues his research in areas including the n-body problem, the Borda count, and the application of mathematics to the social sciences.

Committed to excellence in teaching as well as research, Saari is particularly proud of his numerous teaching awards, including being selected twice by Northwestern students as the universitys Most Influential Professor.

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[nooniansoong]

He seems to care about qualities of election methods that nobody else cares about. He's the only Borda advocate I know of. My studies show Borda distorts election results. Condorcet is better. IRV is chaotic and terrible. Look up "Instant Runoff Normalized Ratings"

[MrSteveSpears]

@progressnerd If you are interested in a reasonable refutation of Instant Runoff Voting, have a look at the video at the Teaching Co. website titled "Voting: Determining the will of the people." At the 20 min. mark he shows some very interesting graphs to compare about five voting methods>

[MrSteveSpears]

@vcool He does seem to allude to Range voting at 57 min., but does not give a detailed explanation for his disqualification, other than the reference to figure skating.

[MrSteveSpears]

Excellent. I have seen the Teaching Co. video by Scott P. Stevens "Voting: Determining the will of the people" (Not on YouTube) and it is very worth while. However, based on the charts that he showed I would have to conclude that this method, the Borda Count, is most representative. The summary of his lecture begins at 43 min.

[vcool]

Why that is utter nonsense

[progressnerd]

Instant Runoff Voting is as good as it gets for single-winner systems.

[vcool]

This was an interesting video to watch. It's a pity that the video doesn't focus on the presentation screen itself.

The Borda count is recommended, but it is hardly the perfect method. Like nearly all other methods, it too suffers from problems. You can look at the Wikipedia article on 'Voting system' and 'Borda count' to learn what these problems are. 'Range voting' as a method was not discussed.

For another good video on voting systems, google "Voting: Determining the Will of the People".